People will cling to anything they can to put down economics. The vast majority of those people don't understand the first thing about economics. Articles like this are intended to inform a wider audience. Obviously it doesn't get through.

At the very beginning, the this article states"economics has had a dreadful decade: it offered no prediction of the subprime or euro crises, and only bitter arguments over how to solve them. " From what I know about economist up to now, I don't totally agree with it. Mostly, economists play a role of advice maker. They analyze the data of economic phenomenon, and then they provide advice for the politician. While whether the politician would take them is uncertain, 'cause there are many uncertainty, and they stand in different stances as economists do. Sometimes politicians ignore these advise. when crises come, people would realize how important it is to seriously consider economists' advise. Besides, the prediction of economy crises cannot be exact, because of the uncertainty among it. Just like the weather prediction. The flowing clouds may change the sunny day to a raining day within half an hour.

Sometimes a fresh reminder of the obvious, especially when all those MBA's and PhD's are in the crunch, equates to good i.e. reneging a purchase because of option-overload.

However, to your point of backups, I disagree: Are you so blind to see the obvious? Large corporations and in this case Yahoo work on a global platform. Which "at night" time frame would you suggest the backup without jeopardizing the brand experience?

I agree with my colleagues on this thread. Especially Justin Goro down below. I'm not an economist but I saw what was going on in the markets because I had street smarts and a fair understanding of the boom and bust business cycle.

When people are living inside a bubble, it's very difficult to actually see what's going on, from there point. I lived through two of them, I lived through the NASDAQ bubble and the housing bubble.

Many people were incredulous that there could be another bubble (housing bubble) so close to the dot-com bubble. But, of course, they were really interrelated. It was almost like the same bubble, because we never really had the fallout from the bursting of the dot-com bubble. We simply replaced one bubble with a bigger bubble, and we postponed the consequences of the unwinding of the imbalances until right now. And, of course, we're still trying to postpone it.

As far as I know, the method that provide less but more relevant ads for the user was first employed by Google, why it was related to the economists' contribution. Improving the relevance of the contents is part of engineer's work, and the point is to find the best algorithm, aren't they?

There are undoubtedly some issues with the GDP measure of a country's well-being. However, when a country acts as an aggregate economic unit, issues like the breaking and fixing of a window (wealth destroying) will drown in a sea of wealth-creating behaviour and thus make economic activity an adequate measure of economic well-being at a given point in time.

Blaming macro economics for making wrong predictions is a misunderstanding of macro as a tool. Macroeconomics is a tool of necessity, the best available tool for guiding states and central banks in their decisions regarding the overall economic development.
As another commenter mentioned, macro economic theory did actually predict both the eurocrisis and the financial crisis, not to a tee, but the build-up of debt was something many economist noted. Regarding the euro-crisis, the current issues where weaker states has borrowed too much because lenders saw the stronger states as security, was one of the major debates when the euro was introduced, and serves as an example of a sub-optimal currency area in many basic macro textbooks written even before 2008.

One of the major issues facing macro, is that it is the politicians and the people that decide which policies to pursue in the end. Historically it has proved very diffucult to convince voters that a contractionary fiscal and monetary policy is the best way to go during a boom, thereby exxagerating the negatives when the bust inevitably occurs.

Global disequilibrium with visibility of sharp screen noises -is what economics is doing to its academic fraternity. Technology in contrast is further fading the line theories supported by nummerical inferences. Result,perhaps, is fool me once shame on me , fool me twice is not shame on me , fool me thrice - one is called wise ,if not economist, with divine wisdom on subject. why then one surprises when GDP verticles show grwoth in geometric progression in service sector and airthmatic progression in tangible resource consolidations -essential for biological non degradtion of human beings . Time to revisit takeways from books of economics as fast one as cotemplates and change cell phones and cars . Sir Expression is not crime ,same as deficit in perceptual vigilance . If it is so I apologize for my unduly inflated anxiety.

As illustrated by the sales process (online or in person) that then try sell add ons i.e. difficult to get to finalise the sale. Make it too onerous, and the seller walks off (log off) and never comes back

People who study philosophy or experienced know that substance is changing and developing. Things get development in changes. Once the problems occur, people need to take measures to resolve it and perfect the principle of it to advance the development.
The market economy promotes the growth of economy, but it also brings something not good, such as subprime crisis or other crisis. To solve the crisis we should figure out why it appears and what it had or will lead to. Then we can take appropriate measures.
As the writer said, a small group of the world’s top microeconomists are changing the way business decisions are made and markets work. I support them very much. We need changes and innovation. New theory and new idea should accept examination of practice and time.
Everyone face tradeoff. Whatever we do, we should consider the opportunity cost and choose the things that have lower opportunity cost to do. So do Micro economists. They must obey the principles of micro economists, if it is necessary, they can perfect the principles and make new principle.
The world’s resources are limited. And also saving is a virtue. To reduce the cost is a good way to promote profit. In other words, the final purpose of most business is using the least resources to get the maximum profit. In the article, the example of yahoo is the use of this principle.
People need interact and trade. The firms always manage to attract people’s attention and arouse people’s desire to buy. At the same time, people should sharpen their vigilance and choose what they really need. The business can bring a win-win situation between firms and people, but how to achieve a win-win situation and keep sustained economic growth is a persistent problem that worth studying.

The essay mainly tell us that economists make markets work better. Microeconomists’ decisions are efficient, but policymakers are out. I am agree with it. In my opinion, economists and policy makers have different stance. Their social roles are different.
The essay is an argumentative passage. The writer says his claim is that meeting the economist who are making markets work better at first. Then he gives readers three evidences from three people who are in Google, eBay and Microsoft.
In the first evidence, the writer tells about Preston McAfee, who now works for Google, finds two categories two prices and help Google to use less costly bandwidth more efficiently. Second, Steve Tadelis who works for eBay made two tests. The two tests also help market work better. The last evidence is that Susan Athey of Microsoft, rely on algorithm deal with the problem between advertisers and users. He makes Microsoft work better.
The essay is not good in my sight. First, the evidence is not sufficient. The claim is that economists are making work better. But the three evidences are all about technology firms. The rage is norrow. From his three evidences, I can’t see the exact data what prove the market work better. Although in the second evidence the writer show us two different parts, it cannot let the all evidence become to sufficient.
Second, I think the evidences are not valid. The technology firms are small in the market. The cannot completely stand for the Market. The title is “ Micro Stars, Macro Effects”, but these evidences don’t describe the macro effects clearly. They emphasize on the economists’ right theory. Even in the third evidence, writer don’t tell readers clearly that the right theory make the Microsoft work better.
Third, these evidences are not reliable. Because there are not exact data, these evidences cannot show reader the market is better. In eight paragraph, the writer says, “Empirical evidence showed that although advertiser would respond only after some time, the eventual gain was worth the wait”. I think this empirical evidence is not reliable. Perhaps I am a person that have never know the effects of advertise, so I can’t judge his evidences.
Last, in his last paragraph, he praises economists and disparages the policymakers. I think the view is personal prejudice.

The title—micro stars create macro effect shows that economists makes the market work better. Macroeconomists have their sight on both economics and on problem outside their home turf too. You know that economy is driven by supply and demand as well as the policies. Governments may make the outcomes better when market failure.
Economists research and study the market by using models and imagination. They conduct a small experience to illustrate economic phenomena. From the passage, we can learn that they supposed in some types of auction more information always raises revenues. And then, they set up a trial to test the idea. Finally, it sometimes true.
Trade makes everyone better off. And tailoring the market meant gains for buyers,sellers and the firms. Do you know why? From the curve of supply and demand, we can learn that when the supply is much greater than the quantity demanded in market, and some products are redundant,price will go down,therefore sellers cannot get interest as they hope. On contrary, the market products is shortage, the price will go up, buyers are not willing to do this. For this reason, fully understand the market can economists make right decision.
And from the passage, we can learn that the ads is a long-term program. We cannot only persue the immediate interests, but look from the whole market and firm. And make a good decision. And we should think at a margin. Providing a little more information may have much impact on the revenue.
We should also use these theories in our daily life to make our life better.

The excerpt "economics has had a dreadful decade: it offered no prediction of the subprime or euro crises, and only bitter arguments over how to solve them. " is seriously misleading as the current neo-classicalists and those adulterated Keynesians(new Keynesians) fail to see the explosion of private debt(not so much public debt unless the country in question is not a sovereign issuer of their currency i.e.Eurozone currencies) as a bellwether for trouble.

Here is a list of economist which predicted way before 2007 that an impending crash was on the cards.

This essay show several economic principles.First of all,people face trade-offs.when people make a decision and they will think about the opportunity cost, namely, whatever must be given up to obtain some item.In this essay， Software giant also met with the problem,money or users.On the one hand,they want to get more profit by increasing advertisements. On the other hand, they will lose their users if just seeking for money. Undoubtedly,this company is not a charity and its goal is to making money.now they need to consider the decision which has a small opportunity.Fortunately,they attempted to reach the balance between advertisements and users.

besides, the essay put forward that how much information provided by sellers may produce a big impact on buyers.More detail information about cars may encourage people to purchase it, while more choice in supermarket make people walk away.They are interesting cases which are helpful and useful to online market like E-bay with the condition of showing plenty of commodities at the same time.

Finally,Economists create new mode to observe economy in the market in more convenient and effective ways. Although now this mode may did not form a system, it is worth endeavor. As economic principle says,the economist as policy adviser can influence decision makers' behavior to certain extent.

This essay show several economic principles.First of all,people face trade-offs.when people make a decision and they will think about the opportunity cost, namely, whatever must be given up to obtain some item.In this essay， Software giant also met with the problem,money or users.On the one hand,they want to get more profit by increasing advertisements. On the other hand, they will lose their users if just seeking for money. Undoubtedly,this company is not a charity and its goal is to making money.now they need to consider the decision which has a small opportunity.Fortunately,they attempted to reach the balance between advertisements and users.

besides, the essay put forward that how much information provided by sellers may produce a big impact on buyers.More detail information about cars may encourage people to purchase it, while more choice in supermarket make people walk away.They are interesting cases which are helpful and useful to online market like E-bay with the condition of showing plenty of commodities at the same time.

Finally,Economists create new mode to observe economy in the market in more convenient and effective ways. Although now this mode may did not form a system, it is worth endeavor. As economic principle says,the economist as policy adviser can influence decision makers' behavior to certain extent.